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For other uses, see Concept (disambiguation).
A concept is an abstraction or generalization from experience or the result of a transformation of existing concepts. The concept reifies all of its actual or potential instances whether these are things in the real world or other ideas. Concepts are treated in many if not most disciplines both explicitly, such as in psychology, philosophy, etc., and implicitly, such as in mathematics, physics, etc.
  • Concepts as mental representations, where concepts are entities that exist in the brain,
  • Concepts as abilities, where concepts are abilities peculiar to cognitive agents, and


The term "concept" is traced back to 1554–60 (Latin conceptum - "something conceived"),[2] but what is today termed "the classical theory of concepts" is the theory of Aristotle on the definition of terms.[citation needed] The meaning of "concept" is explored in mainstream information science,[3][4] cognitive science, metaphysics, and philosophy of mind. In computer and information science contexts, especially, the term 'concept' is often used in unclear or inconsistent ways.[5]

Abstract objects[edit]

Main article: Abstract object
In a platonist theory of mind, concepts are construed as abstract objects.[6] This debate concerns the ontological status of concepts - what they are really like.
There is debate as to the relationship between concepts and natural language.[1] However, it is necessary at least to begin by understanding that the concept "dog" is philosophically distinct from the things in the world grouped by this concept - or the reference class or extension.[7] Concepts that can be equated to a single word are called "lexical concepts".[1]
Study of concepts and conceptual structure falls into the disciplines of philosophy, psychology, and cognitive science.[8]

Issues in concept theory[edit]

A priori concepts[edit]

— Logic, §6

Embodied content[edit]

Main article: Embodied cognition


Main article: Ontology

Mental representations[edit]

Main article: Mental representation
In a physicalist theory of mind, a concept is a mental representation, which the brain uses to denote a class of things in the world. This is to say that it is literally, a symbol or group of symbols together made from the physical material of the brain.[7][8] Concepts are mental representations that allow us to draw appropriate inferences about the type of entities we encounter in our everyday lives.[8] Concepts do not encompass all mental representations, but are merely a subset of them.[7] The use of concepts is necessary to cognitive processes such as categorization, memory, decision making, learning, and inference.[citation needed]

Notable theories on the structure of concepts[edit]

Classical theory[edit]

Main article: Definitionism
The classical theory of concepts, also referred to as the empiricist theory of concepts,[7] is the oldest theory about the structure of concepts (it can be traced back to Aristotle[8]), and was prominently held until the 1970s.[8] The classical theory of concepts says that concepts have a definitional structure.[1] Adequate definitions of the kind required by this theory usually take the form of a list of features. These features must have two important qualities to provide a comprehensive definition.[8] Features entailed by the definition of a concept must be both necessary and sufficient for membership in the class of things covered by a particular concept.[8] A feature is considered necessary if every member of the denoted class has that feature. A feature is considered sufficient if something has all the parts required by the definition.[8] For example, the classic example bachelor is said to be defined by unmarried and man.[1] An entity is a bachelor (by this definition) if and only if it is both unmarried and a man. To check whether something is a member of the class, you compare its qualities to the features in the definition.[7] Another key part of this theory is that it obeys the law of the excluded middle, which means that there are no partial members of a class, you are either in or out.[8]
The classical theory persisted for so long unquestioned because it seemed intuitively correct and has great explanatory power. It can explain how concepts would be acquired, how we use them to categorize and how we use the structure of a concept to determine its referent class.[1] In fact, for many years it was one of the major activities in philosophy - concept analysis.[1] Concept analysis is the act of trying to articulate the necessary and sufficient conditions for the membership in the referent class of a concept.[citation needed]

Arguments against the classical theory[edit]

Given that most later theories of concepts were born out of the rejection of some or all of the classical theory,[6] it seems appropriate to give an account of what might be wrong with this theory. In the 20th century, philosophers such as Rosch and Wittgenstein argued against the classical theory. There are six primary arguments[6] summarized as follows:
  • It seems that there simply are no definitions - especially those based in sensory primitive concepts.[6]
  • Quine's argument against analyticity in Two Dogmas of Empiricism also holds as an argument against definitions.[6]
  • Rosch found typicality effects which cannot be explained by the classical theory of concepts, these sparked the prototype theory.[6] See below.
  • Psychological experiments show no evidence for our using concepts as strict definitions.[6]

Prototype theory[edit]

Main article: Prototype theory
Prototype theory came out of problems with the classical view of conceptual structure.[1] Prototype theory says that concepts specify properties that members of a class tend to possess, rather than must possess.[6] Wittgenstein, Rosch, Mervis, Berlin, Anglin, and Posner are a few of the key proponents and creators of this theory.[6][10] Wittgenstein describes the relationship between members of a class as family resemblances. There are not necessarily any necessary conditions for membership, a dog can still be a dog with only three legs.[8] This view is particularly supported by psychological experimental evidence for prototypicality effects.[8] Participants willingly and consistently rate objects in categories like 'vegetable' or 'furniture' as more or less typical of that class.[8][10] It seems that our categories are fuzzy psychologically, and so this structure has explanatory power.[8] We can judge an item's membership to the referent class of a concept by comparing it to the typical member - the most central member of the concept. If it is similar enough in the relevant ways, it will be cognitively admitted as a member of the relevant class of entities.[8] Rosch suggests that every category is represented by a central exemplar which embodies all or the maximum possible number of features of a given category.[8]


Theory-theory is a reaction to the previous two theories and develops them further.[8] This theory postulates that categorization by concepts is something like scientific theorizing.[1] Concepts are not learned in isolation, but rather are learned as a part of our experiences with the world around us.[8] In this sense, concepts' structure relies on their relationships to other concepts as mandated by a particular mental theory about the state of the world.[6] How this is supposed to work is a little less clear than in the previous two theories, but is still a prominent and notable theory.[6] This is supposed to explain some of the issues of ignorance and error that come up in prototype and classical theories as concepts that are structured around each other seem to account for errors such as whale as a fish (this misconception came from an incorrect theory about what a whale is like, combining with our theory of what a fish is).[6] When we learn that a whale is not a fish, we are recognizing that whales don't in fact fit the theory we had about what makes something a fish. In this sense, the Theory-Theory of concepts is responding to some of the issues of prototype theory and classic theory.[6]


According to the theory of ideasthesia (or "sensing concepts"), activation of a concept may be the main mechanism responsible for creation of phenomenal experiences. Therefore, understanding how the brain processes concepts may be central to solving the mystery of how conscious experiences (or qualia) emerge within a physical system e.g., the sourness of the sour taste of lemon.[11] This question is also known as the hard problem of consciousness.[12][13] Research on ideasthesia emerged from research on synesthesia where it was noted that a synesthetic experience requires first an activation of a concept of the inducer.[14] Later research expanded these results into everyday perception.[15]

See also[edit]


  2. Jump up ^ American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition.
  3. Jump up ^ Stock, W.G. (2010). Concepts and semantic relations in information science. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 61(10), 1951-1969.
  7. ^ Jump up to: a b c d e Carey, Susan (2009). The Origin of Concepts. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-536763-8. 
  9. Jump up ^ 'Godel's Rationalism', Standford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
  10. ^ Jump up to: a b Brown, Roger (1978). A New Paradigm of Reference. Academic Press Inc. pp. 159–166. ISBN 0-12-497750-2. 
  12. Jump up ^ Stevan Harnad (1995). Why and How We Are Not Zombies. Journal of Consciousness Studies 1: 164–167.
  13. Jump up ^ David Chalmers (1995). Facing Up to the Problem of Consciousness. Journal of Consciousness Studies 2 (3): 200–219.

Further reading[edit]

  • Wittgenstein, L. (1999). philosophical investigations: sections 65-78. In E. Margolis, & S. Lawrence, concepts: core readings (pp. 171–175). Massachusetts: MIT press.
  • Conceptual Integration Networks. Gilles Fauconnier and Mark Turner, 1998. Cognitive Science. Volume 22, number 2 (April–June 1998), pages 133-187.

External links[edit]

Look up concept in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
Wikisource has the text of the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica article Concept.

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